Rain and Toads

Toads in boots?

Apparently that tropical storm Hermine blew through this morning. It woke me up around 6 this morning when it tapped against the windows. We tried to get the truck out of the carport and got it mired in the mud by the culvert. Hubs had to fire up the tractor while I gunned it in 4WD in order to dislodge it. Later, we tried to pull the car out so I could go into town tomorrow and had to shove pieces of tin, plywood and anything we could find under the wheels and eventually reverted to just dragging it out with the tractor. It was light enough that it was pretty easy to drag, much easier than jerking the truck out.

Thank god for tractors. No, really.

Our tractor, Earl

It rained all day, we had to dig out the culvert as it got overwhelmed and stuck full of mud. In between rain bands we made some trips to the barn and the chicken coop. I got my foot stuck about three inches in the mud trying to get back to the house. That was set of clothes #1 after I hosed myself off. Moving the car several hours later was set of clothes #3. When the wind would blow in a particular way, we’d get the corner panel of metal roof vibrating resonantly. We parked the car and truck 100 yards up the driveway, then headed out in the evening to see how passable the dirt county roads were to see if we were going to be leaving tomorrow.

We came home to toads. Toads everywhere. At one point there were 15 of them on the front porch. Teeny tiny ones and big fat ones. Hopping all over the place. We got out the spotlight and saw about 20 more out in the yard in puddles, hanging out everywhere. Apparently toads are a sign of prosperity – and who couldn’t use more of that.

Toads of three.

Teeny, tiny, out-of-focus toads.